"That just wasn’t our week!" - Frank Baumann could hardly have summed up the last few days for Werder Bremen more fittingly. A bitter defeat in Stuttgart was followed by the UEFA Cup exit, in spite of a fantastic team performance, and then it was all to be finished off by defeat to VfL Wolfsburg.
"We probably couldn’t have picked a better time to come and play in Bremen", noted VfL coach Felix Magath, following his sides win at the Weser Stadium. The Wolfsburg bosses comments were made with particular reference to the current personnel situation in Bremen.
Patrick Owomoyela has now added to Werder’s long list of injuries. The 28 year old full back had to be substituted at half time on Sunday, suffering from a blocked vertebrae. Club captain Frank Baumann was not interested in talk of draining energy levels or of personnel difficulties but he did admit: "No team can go unaffected when the whole axis is missing."
The Green-Whites list of absentees would appear to be never ending. Diego and Mertesacker are suspended. Klasnic, Frings and Womé are all still unavailable. Tim Borowski had to pull out with a thigh problem whilst Daniel Jensen (hip problem) and Patrick Owomoyela (blocked vertebrae) both had to substituted through injury during the game against VfL.
"If we’d had those players we would definitely have been stronger as they lend us more quality, but we are not about to start crying over what we can’t alter. Of course the situation doesn’t make things easier", concluded Thomas Schaaf.